Carnivores
Carnivores is a fantasy first-person shooter developed by Action Forms and released in 1998 for the PC. Carnivores, released shortly after WizardWork's successful Deer Hunter, "proves itself more than 'just another Deer Hunter clone' by adding two major twists to genre: allowing the hunter to hunt dinosaurs, and allowing the dinosaurs to hunt the hunter as well" as some critics say. The Carnivores 2 sequel gives slightly better graphics, a new format, more dinosaurs and weapons, brand new maps, and an improved AI. Carnivores Ice Age offers a whole new take on the series with animals from the Ice Age and levels to fit the theme. Storyline Gameplay in Carnivores doesn't follow a storyline; the player picks a weapon, a dinosaur, and a hunting area, and they hunt. This lack of plot is followed by Carnivores two sequels as well. However, there is an "official" storyline behind the game: On a routine exploration mission in 2190 A.D., science vessel FMM UV discovered a planet with suitable climate for humankind. During the initial scout expedition, this young planet, code-named FMM UV-32, was declared inhospitable for colony life, due to its unstable terrain and immense population of prehistoric reptiles. News of this amazing planet spread, and articles on the "Dinosaur Planet" lead an Earth corporation to purchase the rights to the planet and create DinoHunt Corp. DinoHunt creates the opportunity for paying customers to become dinosaur hunters for the first time in 50 million years. You are the newest client of DinoHunt Corp. A slightly different version of this is provided in the Readme.txt file found in the game's base installation directory: 2190 AD. On a routine exploration mission, science vessel FMM UV discovered a planet with a suitable climate for humankind. During the initial scouting expedition this young planet, code-named FMM UV-32, was declared inhospitable for colony life due to its unstable terrain and immense population of prehistoric reptiles. News of this amazing planet spread and articles on the "Dinosaur Planet" lead an earth corporation to purchase the rights to the planet, and create DinoHunt Corp. DinoHunt created the unique opportunity for paying customers to become dinosaur hunters for the first time in 50 million years. You are the newest client of DinoHunt Corp. Gameplay The gameplay of the original Carnivores remains constant throughout the series, with few changes. The game opens with a login screen, where users can make a new account or load a previous one. If creating a new account, they will be asked to read and approve a "waiver", stating that the player releases DinoHunt Corp. of responsibility in case the player is injured or killed (an interesting sidenote is that the player can't really be injured in any of the games - the closest the player can come is by staying underwater or walking through lava, in which a health bar pops up; when attacked by dinosaurs, however, any hit is instant death). If accepted, the game proceeds to the main menu. If declined, the program exits. From the main menu, the players cain view their hunting statistics, enter a hunt, view their trophies in the trophy room, change game settings, view credits, or exit the game. In the hunt screen, you must pick a location, animal to hunt, weapon, and equipment. Choosing any equipment decreases the total amount of points you can get on any hunt by a set percentage, except for the tranquilizer, which increases the amount of points obtained. Information on each item is provided. In Carnivores, what dinosaurs, areas and weapons the user can choose depends on that user's rank. After the player has selected their settings, they can hunt. During the hunt, the player is provided with an on-screen compass and wind direction indicator, which can be activated and deactivated with the key. Sometimes the player spawns near a huntable animal, which is bad if the animal is a carnivore. The player can also draw weapons (with the number keys), look at the island map ( ), or use binoculars. When a kill is made, the player's trophy is picked up by a ship, unless tranquilizer mode is used. If the player is killed, all points and trophies earned in that session are lost. The player can choose to exit the map or respawn on the map anytime by pressing or , respectively. If the player dies, he must choose to either exit or respawn. The player can be killed by drowning, burning in lava, or by being attacked, but not by falling (regardless of the height), so climbing mountains is an often-used strategy when hunting carnivores. Animals Areas Weapons Equipment Cheats File formats, files, and extensions * Truevision TGA ("Targa"); raster image format used for the menu screens * WAV; audio file format used for the various in-game sounds * Carnivores 3DF; raw data format used for the sun, wind dial, and some other objects * Carnivores CAR; raw data format used for the animals, weapons, and some other objects * Carnivores MAP; raw data format used for the areas * Carnivores RSC; raw data format used for the areas and containing much of the raw information and the objects * RAW; headerless grayscale bitmap image file used to delineate selectable areas on menus * Carnivores SAV; raw data format used for savegames * TXM; text file used for metric descriptions * TXU; text file used for United States/imperial descriptions * NFO; text file used for equipment descriptions * BMP; bitmap image file used for the area preview screenshots * TXT; text file used for area and weapon descriptions * GRP * PRJ * carnivor.log; log file generated by the game * Readme.txt; readme file installed with the game External links * [http://www.action-forms.com/games/carnivores Carnivores] at Action Forms * [http://www.jurassica.net/carnivores.php?page=main Carnivores] at Jurassica.Net * [http://machf.tripod.com/Hunt/Carn/carn1.htm Carnivores] at The Carnivores Saga * [http://carnivoresfanguild.synthasite.com/Carnivores.php Carnivores] at the Carnivores Fan Guild Category:Games